Touts hoarded tickets reveals Railway probe

Ever wondered why you were unable to book train tickets at ticket counters at 8 am? An internal investigation by the railways has revealed that over 4,000 confirmed seats are hoarded by touts as soon as bookings open.

According to a report in The Indian Express, the probe found that the touts, were exploiting a “facility” in the passenger reservation software which allowed them to alter journey details of already purchased tickets and book another train within seconds at the last moment.

The process would take very less time as details provided by them would already be available in the system. The touts would purchase tickets for less popular trains a day in advance and then swap them for more popular ones.

Ajay Shukla, Member (Traffic), Railway Board, was quoted in The Indian Express as saying, “Touts would buy any ticket a day in advance and the next day, they would get ticket details changed. The booking clerk merely had to generate another PNR with the passenger details already fed into the system a day earlier. This took seconds.” 

The loophole has now been fixed and anyone wanting to exchange bookings can only do so after the first hour.

The ministry is also trying to nab the booking clerks who were involved with the touts is this operation. The black market train ticket operation is a very lucrative one with touts standing to make huge amounts of money preying on the needs of passengers.